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Highlights from the ITS America Session on High Performance System Operations

Four speakers Jeffrey F. Paniati (Associate Administrator for Operations, FWHA, U.S. DOT), John F. Conrad (Assistant Secretary for Engineering and Regional Operations, Washington State DOT), Stephen C. Lockwood (Principal, PB Consult), and Richard Mudge (Vice President, Delcan Corp.) representing the federal, state, research and consulting communities, discussed how the next 20–30 years will look as a much greater emphasis is placed on managing the existing infrastructure to better manage congestion.

This article focuses on Mr. Conrad’s comments. NTOC Talks will publish more articles addressing the research and consulting perspectives over the next few issues.

State Perspective
Mr. Conrad conveyed the vision of operating the 21st Century Interstate, which focuses on enhancing competitiveness and meeting the growing interstate travel demand while providing the highest level of service.

In order to achieve this vision of the transportation system, additional programs and systems must become an integral part of infrastructure management.

Real-time operations and management will require new organizational structures and workforce capacity as well as new performance management tools through SHRP II. Supporting standards and guidance for operations strategies to employ key ITS services and functions will be needed. States want to have flexibility in creating managed lanes and pricing the service to match supply and demand. In addition, the deployment of VII and next generation technology will need to fit into the new transportation structures.

An issue for special focus is preparation for response operations during emergencies and evacuations. A number of different elements need to be put into place so the states have a response ready.